6 comments:

Anonymous
said...

DOE's CI guys can't wait to pull the clearance on a a big name candidate like Pedicini as a means of sending a strong message to the LANL staff that things have radically changed. It's similar to when judges go after big name celebrity like Paris Hilton for DWI infractions. It gets attention.

Don't expect shenanigans like the 'Pedicini Requirement' to have any chance of success on this go around. DOE is looking for ways to scare the LANL staff into total compliance. The polygraph is going to be a major tool in this new effort. We are quickly entering into hard-ball territory, whether we like it or not, and DOE wants to see some fear in the eyes of the LANL staff.

When responses to Control questions look too strong, like at the end of this video, the examiner will immediately suspect the candidate of using counter-measures. That's almost as good as saying "I'm guilty of something!".

You cannot beat the polygraph. Give it up. If you lie, it will detect your lies almost 99.9% of the time when interpreted by a qualified examiner. The DOD train all the government's polygraph examiners using rigous techniques and they are all very good at what they do.

Hi, I'm George Maschke (the same who appears in the video). Polygraph examiner Bruce Burgess's vague assertion that because he saw reactions to both the control questions and the relevant questions, he "knew someone was messing around" is rubbish. There is nothing in the polygraph literature to support any such notion.

And the above claim by an anonymous commentator that "you cannot beat the polygraph" is contradicted by the available peer-reviewed research (by Charles Honts and collaborators, citations in the bibliography of The Lie Behind the Lie Detector.) The notion that the polygraph can detect lies at all, let alone with 99.9% accuracy, is patently absurd (see Chapter 1 of the The Lie Behind the Lie Detector and the sources cited therein).

As for the vaunted "DoD training" that all federal polygraph examiners receive, it's 14 weeks -- less than half the length of the typical barber college. And while graduates of barber college can generally cut hair, graduates of polygraph school cannot detect lies.

Additional relevant documentation on polygraph "testing" is available from AntiPolygraph.org.

You cannot beat the dunking test. Give it up. 99.9% of people who float are witches. The test is the result of 1000 years of rigorous study. Anyone who challenges it is trying to hide the fact that they're a witch.

On the subject of training videos, DOE produced its own propaganda piece on polygraph screening a few years back. AntiPolygraph.org obtained a copy under the Freedom of Information Act. See commentary here.